SCIENTISTS SAID THERE IS EVIDENCE OF UNDERGROUND LAKES SYSTEM ON MARS

Scientists say images of craters taken by European and American space probes show there likely once was a planet-wide system of lakes on Mars.

Data collected by NASA and ESA probes orbiting the red planet provide the first geological evidence for an ancient Martian groundwater system, according to a study by researchers in Italy and the Netherlands published in the Journal of Geophysical Research.

Francesco Salese, one of the scientists involved, said in an email Friday that the findings confirm earlier models and smaller-scale studies, and that the underground lakes may have been connected to each other.

The notion of water on Mars has long fascinated scientists because of the possibility that the planet may have once harboured similar conditions to those that allowed life to develop on Earth.

Patches of ice previously spotted on Mars provide tantalizing hints of a watery past for the arid world.